As our homes and neighborhoods are overrun this Halloween night with ghouls and goblins with an appetite for candy, here’s a thought: Would you be willing to live in a real “haunted house?”

If you believe in that sort of thing, there’s a house for sale — at 100 Terrace Avenue in Toms River — with such a colorful history.

It was at this house in 2012, where Josue Chinchilla and Michele Callan filed a lawsuit in state Superior Court against their landlord, Dr. Richard Lopez, for his alleged failure to disclose that something was already occupying the residence, just across the street from St. Joseph Grade School and Donovan Catholic High School.

The couple sued to get out of their lease and for the return of their $2,250 deposit. After the Asbury Park Press first reported on the litigation, the story went viral and garnered national attention. Later, as a result of the publicity, both parties agreed to have their case heard on the long-running, nationally syndicated television program “The People’s Court,” where celebrity Judge Marilyn Milian ruled against the couple.

The judgment was rendered on the basis that there are no legal grounds to vacate a lease because the occupants believe the premises to be haunted. Nevertheless, Milian ordered Lopez, a respected orthodontist in Toms River whose practice was next door to the house, to spend a night in the residence.

As of today, the house has been on the market for more than a year with no sellers to date.

Jeri J. Earle, a real estate agent with Weichert Realtors of Toms River, had represented the listing before Coletta Commercial Realty recently took over the sale of the property. She said she was unaware of all the fuss. The market value of the house is currently listed at $276,600.

Earle said she was never informed of any issues related to the property — such as the notion it is haunted — which is on a corner lot adjacent to Lopez's office complex on Hooper Avenue.

“I’ve been in that place many times, I’ve never seen anything,” Earle said.

A “haunted house” does not necessarily deter prospective buyers. A survey this month by Realtor.com reports that 33 percent out of 1,000 people said they would be willing to buy a home with such a spooky reputation.

But if you are indeed a believer and you think the house on Terrace Avenue may be for you, you might want to know what you’re in for. This reporter has some firsthand experience here.

A Haunting We Will Go

Back in March 2012, it was my editor who received a late night voicemail from a panicked Callan, whose family had just fled the home in question, which they had only moved into one week earlier.

The house was haunted, Callan insisted. The exasperated 36-year-old mother and fiancée explained they were intent on going through the courts to prove it.

A few days later, a photographer and I were sent to meet the family for an interview at their forsaken house at the corner of Lowell and Terrace avenues — an unremarkable looking three bedroom ranch built in 1959 and located along one of the busiest traffic jughandles in Toms River.

Callan was joined by her fiancé Chinchilla, 37, and her teenage daughter, Ashley.

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In this Asbury Park Press file photo from March 2012, Josue Chinchilla, his fiancée Michele Callan and her daughter Ashley, stand outside their rental house at 100 Terrace Avenue in Toms River. Within days of moving in, the family said they discovered they were not the only occupants of the home.(Photo: Bob Bielk, Asbury Park Press)

Since that night, they had been living in a one-room motel in Point Pleasant Beach. As soon as they pulled into the driveway behind the house I could see they were uncomfortable. It had not been their idea to return to the house — I had insisted on a tour and photos — and furthermore they were worried I would portray them as kooks.

After introductions, they unlocked the back door to the kitchen and we all went in. I advised them I would be using a digital recorder to be sure I quoted them accurately, which remained on the whole time we were together while clutched in my right hand.

I observed that the house seemed bigger than it appeared from the outside. There was a furnished basement below and a spacious family room at one end of the house — all with a very 1980s’ vibe.

I watched with interest as Callan and her daughter moved quickly from room to room, like victims of a break-in, debating whether their belongings — left behind in their frantic midnight exodus — had been disturbed or moved in their absence.

With the bright afternoon sunlight streaming in through the open Venetian window blinds and the constant rumble of traffic outside, it was difficult to imagine anyone feeling the need to flee this place.

However, all three family members began to explain what had happened in the week they had moved into the house — an escalating series of unexplained phenomena that seemed intent on driving them out.

Terror on Terrace Avenue

It started soon after the family moved in, they recalled. They would come home from work and school to find their clothes ejected from their bedroom closets, strewn over the floors. Doors creaked open and slammed closed in unoccupied areas of the house. Lights switched on and off without human intervention.

In the overnight hours, footsteps were heard from the empty kitchen after everyone was tucked in and they swore they could hear unintelligible whispering in the air from no visible source.

The most disturbing thing, they claimed, was the sound that came through the vents to the basement — a muffled din of something that sounded like a large animal, lumbering 7 feet below their feet.

Each room had a story from that week of hell, a moment where someone recalled that they had heard this or that, or where something more terrifying had taken place.

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Asbury Park Press reporter Erik Larsen revisits a house in Toms River which former residents claim is haunted. Larsen's audio recording of the residents interview has an unexplained voice.
Toms River, NJ
Wednesday, October 26, 2017
@dhoodhood
(Photo: Doug Hood)

Chinchilla said he initially applied logic and common sense to what was happening. At first, they ignored the peculiar occurrences. It takes time getting used to any house.

Could be the boiler or maybe the central air conditioning, they assured each other.

However, such rationalism failed him after the events of March 10, 2012 — the night the family left.

Just before they bundled everyone into their car and took off for a hotel down the road, Chinchilla and Callan had settled into bed to watch television.

That’s when he heard a tapping noise against the set. After having spent that week trying to be the voice of reason, he tried to ignore it. There had to be a rational explanation that was simply not immediately evident.

But then Chinchilla felt a tug on the sheets over him. He watched in bewilderment as the bedclothes began to slide off him. He then felt an invisible hand land on his arm. Callan, who was next to him, claims she saw what looked like a shapeless dark apparition in the bedroom.

"I don't believe in this stuff," said Chinchilla, even after speaking openly about an invisible hand and bedsheets that move on their own.

"We're living in it," Callan interjected, who explained she had become convinced that the house was not merely haunted, but that the family was being subjected to something truly evil. Something perhaps only religion or faith can offer an explanation for.

'They don't know'

I was struck by the family’s earnestness. Whatever was going on here, whether it was some form of hysteria or whatever, they seemed absolutely convinced about what they were telling me. As we moved from room to room, they became more comfortable with me and more animated about their experiences.

After I left the house, I went back to the office, sat down at my desk, put on my earphones and began to transcribe the interview from my digital recorder.

Less than 10 minutes into the audio, I heard something that I have been unable to explain since.

As the family was telling me about their ordeal and what they thought was happening to them, a childlike voice is heard whispering directly into my recorder: “They don’t know.”

My first reaction as I recall was amusement. I didn’t recognize the voice as belonging to the five of us who were present, but I conceded that a whisper wouldn’t necessarily be identifiable. The voice came at a time as we were leaving the family room and no one else was speaking at that particular moment. I let the recording continue to play, listening for context but none came.

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Asbury Park Press reporter Erik Larsen revisits a house in Toms River which former residents claim is haunted. Larsen's audio recording of the residents interview has an unexplained voice.
Toms River, NJ
Wednesday, October 26, 2017
@dhoodhood
(Photo: Doug Hood)

As all my colleagues in the room were aware that I had spent part of my afternoon at a “haunted house,” I was eager to share with them the recording of the unidentified voice. One by one, I placed the earphones over their heads and watched their eyes widen and light up with the same initial amusement and general weirdness I had felt after listening to the recording.

It occurred to me that I may have recorded the family’s teenage daughter in a brief side conversation with her mother or Chinchilla.

Eventually, I played the recording back for the family so they could tell me which of them may have been the “ghost voice” I had captured.

“That’s not me,” Ashley said, as if she were being accused of something sinister.

To this day, I’m not sure what I recorded and because I’d like to be employable in the future, I’m not saying it’s a ghost or something that can only be explained in Biblical terms.

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Jane Doherty, a local psychic medium from South Plainfield who says she has witnessed multiple paranormal phenomenon at the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth, speaks Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016, about her experiences there. IMAGE MADE WITH A NIGHTVISION EQUIPPED CAMERA THOMAS P. COSTELLO

Jane Doherty, a psychic medium from South Plainfield who says she has witnessed multiple paranormal phenomenon at the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth, speaks Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016, about her experiences there. THOMAS P. COSTELLO

Ken Lund, Piscataway, and Chris T, Metuchen, use a FLIR to keep watch on a second floor window at the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016. Lund believed he had seen the figure of a woman in that window. IMAGE MADE WITH A NIGHTVISION EQUIPPED CAMERA THOMAS P. COSTELLO

Jane Doherty, a psychic medium from South Plainfield, senses the spirits of children playing outside the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016. She says that her stomach expands when she senses those spirits. THOMAS P. COSTELLO

A second floor window at the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016, where Ken Lund, Piscataway, believed he had seen the figure of a woman. IMAGE MADE WITH A NIGHTVISION EQUIPPED CAMERA THOMAS P. COSTELLO

Jane Doherty says she senses the spirit of a pirate who once visited the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016. Doherty, a psychic medium from South Plainfield, says she has witnessed multiple paranormal phenomenon here. IMAGE MADE WITH A NIGHTVISION EQUIPPED CAMERA THOMAS P. COSTELLO

Ken Lund, Piscataway, uses a FLIR to watch a window at the Seabrook-Wilson House in Port Monmouth Tuesday evening, October 18, 2016, where reported that he had seen the figure of a woman. IMAGE MADE WITH A NIGHTVISION EQUIPPED CAMERA THOMAS P. COSTELLO